


Crash Into Me

by SwimminNnoodles



Category: Haikyuu!!, ハイパープロジェクション演劇「ハイキュー!!」| Hyper Projection Play "Haikyuu!!" RPF
Genre: Gay, Haikyuu Month, IwaizumixOikawa - Freeform, M/M, Slow Burn, Surgeon AU, haikyuu au, iwaizumi/oikawa - Freeform, iwaoi - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-30
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:29:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21622255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SwimminNnoodles/pseuds/SwimminNnoodles
Summary: Iwaizumi Hajime embarks on his medical career as a Surgical intern at Miyagi Central Hospital. He scrambles to learn all he can from some of the best surgeons in the country, all while competing with other brilliant interns—one of which seems to be a lot more distracting than the others.Oikawa Toru, with his perfect face and perfect hair, his brilliant mind and pretty eyes; he has Iwaizumi struggling to keep his focus.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime & Oikawa Tooru, Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 15
Kudos: 115





	1. Stitch Me Up

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!  
> Welcome to the second fic to my Haikyuu Hospital!Au, where all of your favorite volleyball boys compete in an extremely competitive medical environment. Expect lots of drama and romance in the near future.  
> I hope you like IwaOi because I know I LOVE this ship. I’ve been going through their story line for a very long time.  
> If you like the au, you can check out the other piece to the Hospital AU—another one of my favorite ships, Semi and Shirabu. 
> 
> Anyways, enjoy the first chapter of “Crash Into Me” an Iwaoi fic. If you enjoy it, PLEASE leave a comment or a kudos, I LOVE to hear what you all think about my work—it really makes my day.  
> I don’t have any medical experience so please forgive me if there is any problems with the accuracy. I try my best.  
> I hope you are having a lovely day, enjoy the fic :)
> 
> Also for some reason I didn’t press whatever button that makes the fic have multiple chapters but I promise there will be more to this even if it says there will only be one chapter :/

Iwaizumi Hajime could never see his bad decisions right away. 

They always seemed alright at first, then jumped back into his life yelling, ‘surprise! I’m here to ruin everything!’ a few days or even weeks later. It wasn’t until his life seemed to be going perfectly fine that he went ahead and did something to fuck it up—or at least something he thought would turn his normal life into chaos. 

But of course what kind of god, goddess, Karma, or whatnot would allow  _ his  _ life to stay normal for such a long time? It was always something, usually caused by Iwaizumi himself, that threw the balance off. He’d pay a bill late, he’d end up taking a whole week in the ER by accident, or maybe his obsessive mother would decide to ambush his very small apartment for a few days. The tiniest things could throw his life out of the balance he enjoyed so much. 

Currently, everything was going alright. For the past two or three weeks he’d managed to get by without any catastrophic events that would stress him out for days on end. But as mentioned, bad decisions seem to hide before they came back to bite him in the ass, he just hoped the good decisions would follow suit. 

He could use some unexpected good luck from time to time; that was something he wasn’t even sure existed at this point in life. The best that Iwaizumi could currently hope for would be to maintain the steady flow of ‘normal’ that has kept him sane for the past few weeks. 

He woke up feeling fine. He never felt good in mornings; not that any surgical intern ever woke up feeling more than fine. Although his recent weeks could be described as fairly calm, to any other person his ‘regular’ day would look like absolute hell—and maybe it was. He worked 80 hours a week, running all over an enormous building chasing his teachers around as they stuck their hands into dying people in an attempt to, well, stop them from dying. He’d only been released from med-school to be thrown into an arena where he could not sleep, eat, or socialize without being a surgeon first. It’s been eleven months and Iwaizumi was completely reliant on caffeine to keep him alive.

But he loved every second of it. He lived for the rush of adrenaline that shoots through his body the moment he hears the blaring siren of an ambulance. He loved the smell of the sterilizer and the feel of the tight surgical gloves that hugs the skin on his hands. And he never ceases to be amazed by the incredible moment he watches his teachers legitimately steal a human life right out of the palms of death’s hands. The rush is exactly what makes the stress and sleepless nights completely worth it. 

And so his morning was fairly normal. His apartment was cold despite the contrasting temperature outside, the chilled wood on the floor stung at his bare feet as he unwillingly dragged himself out from the warmth of his bed. Iwaizumi’s apartment was tiny but comfortable, barely legible for the label ‘two roomed’. His bed was across from a small living area, which led into a tiny kitchen.

He dressed hastily, struggling to find clothes that were at least semi-clean. His job left very little time for laundry, or in fact, groceries. The only thing in Iwaizumi’s refrigerator was water, rice, and of course, vodka. Though it didn’t matter. Iwaizumi ate almost all of his meals at the hospital, another reason he didn’t mind his tiny living conditions; not that it was any different than what he grew up in. 

The contents of his refrigerator resulted in Iwaizumi shoving a sad piece of toast into his mouth as he ran out the door, slamming it shut behind him. He was already early—he always was.

Iwaizumi has always goten to the hospital just in time to snag the good cases from the other interns in his class. He had no other choice but to get ahead by forcing himself to wake up at the crack of dawn—his year was filled with many fresh surgeons who were just as bright, if not brighter than Iwaizumi. He fought tooth and nail for the good cases, the good teachers, and even the good seats in the surgical gallery. 

His old car was cool on the inside, the dark paint coated in the shiny early morning dew. When Iwaizumi shoved the key in and turned, the engine growled for a moment before roaring alive. Another benefit to his early morning endeavors was the light traffic. Iwaizumi was fairly certain that no other human being, besides perhaps, surgeons, had enough self loathing to be on the road by 5:00 in the morning. The sun was just barely peeking over the horizon, laying an airy sheet of fuzzy sunlight onto the quiet streets and into Iwaizumi’s eyes.

He let his mind wander, the drive had already been engraved into his brain so that every traffic light and turn was just second nature. An aortic tamponade, broken bones, ruptured spleens, the list or possible surgeries he’d get to watch was endless. 

And so, it seemed, was the stupidity of the human race. He turned the corner and slowed, his attention drawn to the scene in the middle of the road in front of him. There were two Cars in the middle of the street, massive dents and scars covered the vehicles’ sides, while bits and pieces of their casing had been scattered across the premises. 

Nasty. Was the first thing Iwaizumi thought to himself when he pulled up to the wreck. Debris spewed around everywhere so that the intersection had become a beach of metal and rubber. With the metal skewered about, and smoke fuming from the battered engines, Iwaizumi pulled over and parked the truck by the side of the road. The vehicles were a mess. Iwaizumi could only imagine the state of the passengers.

Iwaizumi noticed a third car in the midst of the crash site. It was a small, silver Mercedes. The round car was sleek and obviously untouched by the crash. 

Finally Iwaizumi was able to jump out of his car, pushing past the small crowd of anxious bystanders, the ocean of shredded metal opening up in front of him. 

“Oh man,” Iwaizumi whispered to himself, as he jogged towards the vehicles. 

The first car, was a large SUV, which looked like it had driven straight into a brick wall. The nose of the large black car had been smashed inwards, crunching up into itself like an accordion. The windshield was shattered into a spiderweb of tiny glass shards that sat above the inflated airbags. As Iwaizumi approached the first car, the stench of burnt rubber infiltrated his senses, sticking his nose and burning in his head. He briefly scrunched his nose at the odor, before quickly turning his attention to the first victim of the crash.

A woman, around thirty years old, had dragged herself out of the SUV driver’s seat. Her hair was knotted and clumped in the thick red blood that was spewing from the gash on her forehead. She stood there, clenching a black leather purse to her chest as she heaved. Her dark eyes were watery, tears leaving trails of clean skin down her dirty cheeks. 

“Miss,” Iwaizumi jogged towards her, carefully approaching the woman when she jerked her head to the side.

“I-I was-“ her voice was raspy, the words spilling out in between shuddered heaves of breath. “-I was just going to work..”

“Miss, it’s alright,” Iwaizumi said as he gently laid a hand on her shoulder, taking a closer look at the injury on her face. “My name is Iwaizumi, I’m a doctor. Can you tell me your name?” He spoke slowly and clearly, trying not to worry the horrified lady any more that she already was. He really wasn’t trained enough for this kind of stuff. After all, he was just an intern. He’d only been working at the hospital for slightly less than a year. Though he had his medical license, he hardly felt qualified to tell car crash victims he was a doctor. 

The woman sniffled, nodding slightly. “Ikumi.” She breathed.

“Alright Ikumi, I see that you have a bad cut in your forehead, but I need to know if your injured anywhere else.” The woman looked over at where the other car was and slowly shook her head.

“I-I don’t think so. The other doctor said I’d have to go to the hospital but that the other driver was much worse.”

“Other doctor?” Iwaizumi spun around, once again spotting the untouched Mercedes, sloppily parked near the other vehicle. Looking closer, he saw that it’s driver’s door had been sprung open, left hanging outside the car’s side. 

Iwaizumi didn’t let himself wonder who this other doctor was, having been at this crash scene the whole time he’d been there, nodding to Ikumi before heading over to the worse half of the crash. 

Indeed, whoever had been unfortunate enough to be driving the small white Sedan had bigger problems than a cut to the face. The smell of smoke and burning rubber grew stronger, filling Iwaizumi’s head with a burning sensation he really wished would go away. 

Flipped onto its back, the car looked as if it had been a chew toy to an incredibly aggressive dog. The driver’s side of the car was almost completely demolished, the metal doors twisted around like a dislocated limb. 

As he rounded the side of the car, Iwaizumi finally caught a glance of the ‘other doctor’ Miss Ikumi had mentioned. It took a while for him to recognize the young man who was crouched on the ground on the driver’s side, obviously trying to help the person inside. From what Iwaizumi could tell, he was tall and thin. He wore a navy short-sleeved button down, along with dark beige thin-cut pants and some very expensive looking shoes. If he knew Iwaizumi was standing right next to the car, he didn’t acknowledge it. 

Iwaizumi awkwardly stood there, the glass crackling under his shoes as he tried to figure out a way to announce his presence. 

God, people are  _ dying  _ and he can’t freaking introduce himself. 

A second later Iwaizumi was finally forced to interact, regretting every awkward moment in the situation that should definitely  _ not  _ revolve around his horrible social skills. 

“Dammit!” Hissed the other doctor from inside the overturned vehicle. He blindly reached out behind him, feeling his hand around the glass speckled ground.“I need more gauze.”

Iwaizumi tore himself away from his trance and kneeled down next to the driver’s seat door. He grabbed the last hunk of white fluff from the scrappy first-aid kit and slapped it into the other’s hand, his year of surgical training finally clicking into gear. 

“That’s the last of it,” Iwaizumi said. He must of startled the other because he finally pulled himself out of the car.

“Oh.” The young man next to him said, and finally Iwaizumi was able to see his face, and even put a name to it. He almost instantly recognized the wavy chocolate brown hair, now a long, curly mess from his time in the wreaked car. A pair of black wire glasses were crookedly perched on his head, revealing the big brown eyes Iwaizumi had noticed first all those months ago. His face now was dirty and his hair messy, but the eyes stayed the same.

“You’re Iwaizumi, right?” 

“Yeah, I was on my way to work and I saw the crash,” he hesitated, “thought I could help.”

“Good.”

He’d met this doctor only once, despite the fact that they’ve been working in the same hospital since last year. They’d been separated into two different intern classes, so they never interacted except at the ‘intern mixer party’ the hospital had attempted to throw for the new surgeons—the fresh meat. 

Of course the whole thing had been full of awkward introductions and disastrous attempts at a conversation. 

Except for him. 

Charming and exuberant, he waltzed his way through the party and may have made friends with his entire intern class before the deserts were served. Iwaizumi recalled their introduction, which was painfully short. 

Oikawa Tooru graduated from a very prestigious medical school. That’s all he knew; he couldn’t even remember the name of the school. 

“There’s nothing we can really do before we get him out of this car,” Oikawa mumbled, maybe to himself, as Iwaizumi rounded the car and climbed through the passenger side, wincing as the broken glass cut through his shirt and lodged into his skin. Whatever happened to cause this accident definitely was not worth the pain this victim was about to feel. There was an open head wound, oozing blood down onto what was the roof and was now the floor. Their immobile patient was strapped to the seat, hanging upside down in their overturned car. He was covered in thousands of microscopic pieces of glass, each lodged into the man’s skin. As Iwaizumi felt around, he noticed several broken ribs, and possible internal bleeding in the stomach.

“When did the ambulance say they’d get here?” Iwaizumi asked, trying to get a hold of the bleeding on the man’s face, which was a lot harder now that all three of them were crammed in the tiny sedan. 

“Ten minutes,” Oikawa’s voice was strained as he aimlessly used his phone flashlight to examine the man’s eyes. He felt around the driver’s forehead and temple, and Iwaizumi noticed his face darken as he felt what was probably a skull fracture.

“Ten minutes?” Finally the man spoke, or more whispered. His voice was raspy and raw, sputtering out the words from the back of his throat, which had been filled to the top with worry. “You called them ten minutes ago.”

“I know I’m sorry,” Oikawa soothed as best as he could, feeling around some more at the base of his patient’s skull. “It’s hard to get around all the traffic.”

That’s right, it was now 6:00 in the morning—rush hour.

“Once they get here we’ll be able to get you out,” Iwaizumi added. 

“Just hang on a little longer,” Oikawa said. 

“Just—a little longer—“ 

Iwaizumi realized a split-second too late when the man’s words slurred. 

“He’s—“ Iwaizumi barely managed to form the words before their patient started violently shaking. His eyes rolled into the back of his head and his jaw constricted. Iwaizumi reached forward and tried his best to hold their patient’s neck and head steady as they waited out the seizure. 

Oikawa cursed quietly to himself before pulling open the man’s eyelids as the eruption of muscle spasms died down. 

“Pupil’s blown-“

“His brain’s probably swelling,” Iwaizumi finished the thought. Oikawa turned and looked up from the now unconscious patient at Iwaizumi.

“We need that ambulance.”

A horrible raspy choking sound came from the unconscious victim’s mouth, and immediately Oikawa looked up from the head wound to Iwaizumi. While holding pressure on the bleeding cut on the man’s forehead, Oikawa leaned into the car wreckage and held his ear against the man, held upside down in his overturned car. Oikawa furrowed his brow and pulled his lips into a frown, his face scrunching up underneath his mess of unusually messy hair.

_ Bad news _ , Iwaizumi thought as he struggled to crawl into the passenger side closer to the crash victim. 

As he struggled over the shard of glass Iwaizumi’s cheekbone caught on a shard of glass lodged into the leather seats, and he felt a horrible ripping sensation scouting through the skin on his face. Iwaizumi hissed in pain, but continued to move closer to their patient. 

“I think it might be cardiac tamponad,” Iwaizumi strained, wiping the thick blood streaming off of his face with the sleeve ofhis t-shirt. “I think I hear a heart murmur”

“Shit.” Oikawa pulled out of the diver’s door and rounded the car, yanking at the back seat until the door swung open enough for him to climb in. “Okay I think I see it. It’s some sort of metal rod that’s lodged into his chest through the back.”

Iwaizumi couldn’t prevent the flow of possible ways cardiac tamponad could kill someone from running through his head. The man’s pericardium was filling with blood and adding pressure to the heart. It needed to be drained as soon as possible or he’d die before they even reached the hospital. 

Just then the blaring sirens of an ambulance filled their ears, possibly the most relieving sound either surgical intern had ever heard.The ambulance sirens were followed by that of a fire truck—whatever was lodged into this guy’s heart would definitely take more than two surgical interns and some paramedics. Oikawa pulled himself out of the car to go meet the two ambulances and the fire truck, momentarily leaving Iwaizumi alone with their patient. 

“He’s got an open head lac, obvious head trauma, and a possible cardiac tamponad.I think it’s from whatever is jammed into his back,” Oikawa said as he returned to the crash scene with three paramedics.

Expecting to see Oikawa’s face return to the other side of their patient, Iwaizumi couldn’t help but notice the oddly disappointed felling he got when he saw a women in a paramedic’s uniform appear instead. 

She took out a stethoscope, reached over and held it to the man’s left side of his chest. 

“We need to drain the pericardium before we do anything else. I need the portable ultrasound and an 18 gauge needle.” She looked up at Iwaizumi, her expression blank. “And I need you to move.”

She pulled herself out from Oikawa’s previous position in the overturned car and rounded the car to the passenger side. The paramedic crouched down, indicating that she would take Iwaizumi’s spot at the victim’s left side. A second paramedic arrived, holding a portable ultrasound and a very,  _ very  _ large syringe. 

“Move,” She said. 

“Hold on-“ Iwaizumi began, but Oikawa quickly cut him off. 

“You should let him do it,” Oikawa said firmly. His words were sharp and clear. 

The paramedic scoffed, rolling her eyes, even. “Look I don’t have time for your stupid surgical arrogance. Get out of the damn car so I can  not  puncture this guys heart, and save his life.”

“Switching spots would take too long. Do you  _ really _ want to be the one to cost this man his life because you can’t get over the fact that we’re surgeons and you’re a paramedic?” Oikawa lifted his chin slightly, the pout on his face growing more prominent as his golden-chestnut eyes narrowed. “Besides, he’s the best surgical resident at the hospital, so I would let him do it if I were you.”

Iwaizumi was so shocked by the sudden vote of confidence from a stranger—even if it wasn’t particularly true—he almost forgot to take the gigantic needle from the paramedic’s incredibly annoyed hands. When he turned back to the patient, Oikawa was back at the driver’s door, switching on the portable ultrasound and awkwardly reaching over the patient to hold the wand over his heart. 

“Alright,” Oikawa murmured, turning the small screen so that Iwaizumi could see the entrance point of the syringe against the pericardium. For a fleeting moment, Iwaizumi locked eyes with the man kneeling across from him, his sharp green eyes sinking into Oikawa’s dark brown eyes, somehow making Iwaizumi’s heartbeat slow just a little. “Don’t make me a liar.”

Iwaizumi pressed the needle into the victim’s chest, watching the monitor as the thin metal syringe sunk into the pericardium, slowing just before it breached the cardiac wall. Part of him waited for reassurance from Oikawa, but he knew it wouldn’t come—he needed to be sure of himself. Iwaizumi pulled on the syringe, watching as the large tube quickly filled with dark red blood. 

_ Perfect _ . Somehow. 

Iwaizumi steadied his shaking hands as he evacuated the last of the blood and removed the syringe. He heard Oikawa let out a small breath of relief, pulling the ultrasound away and scooting out of the cramped space in the driver’s seat. Iwaizumi did the same, backing away so the firefighters could work at extracting their patient from the car. Oikawa came to the passenger side of the car and helped Iwaizumi out of the flipped car. 

For a few moments, Iwaizumi had forgot about the throbbing cut on his left cheekbone, which continued to bleed aggressively, now soaking part of his face in blood. The female paramedic approached them and scoweled, “I hope you know that I’m going to report both of you to the chief of surgery,” she scoffed.

Oikawa scrunched his nose, a tiny twitch barely catching Iwaizumi’s attention, the way his clear olive skin wrinkled around his eyes. “For what?” Oikawa rebutted, “saving this man’s life?” 

_Arrogant_ ,  Iwaizumi thought briefly—the way Oikawa handled things so confidently, despite only being a first year resident; and the way he gave Iwaizumi a side-eyed glance after the snotty paramedic huffed and walked back to the rig.  _Arrogant, but in the most intriguing way possible_. 

“Okay, we’re bringing him out on three!” A firefighter said, joining the other men in freeing the victim from the seatbelt and pulling him out of the car. They placed him on a gurney and swiftly transferred him into the ambulance. Both Oikawa and Iwaizumi followed, stepping up into the big red vehicle and sitting in the cushioned seats at the wall of the ambulance. Before they knew it, the ambulance doors slammed shut and they were moving. 

Iwaizumi felt bad about being so excited to get back to the hospital and scrub in on a surgery. It would be one hell of a surgery; the subdural hematoma, cardiac tamponad, as well as several breaks and fractures. The fact that he and Oikawa were able to pick up an incredible surgery on the side of the road was more than luck. As incredibly wrong as that sounded, Iwaizumi knew first hand how difficult it was for interns to get in on surgeries, so bringing in the patient—crash site to Operating Room—was a free ticket to a spot at the operating table. He couldn’t help the excitement rushing through his nerves, lacing his blood with adrenaline; Iwaizumi couldn't even feel the pain of the wound on his cheek. He had haphazardly slapped a bandage over his face to stop it from actively bleeding as soon as they got into the rig. The laceration still hurt like hell though. 

He glanced over at Oikawa, sitting next to him on the rig, hands twitching slightly in his lap. For a brief moment Iwaizumi studied those hands. He had heard the stories, the gossip—Oikawa was the best intern in the entire program, arguably better than even some of the residents. Those hands were practically made for surgery. At first glance, they were smooth and clean, slightly blood-stained; however, after a moment Iwaizumi noticed the slight twitch in his fingers, and the small bruise on the bone of his left wrist. 

Iwaizumi quickly glanced away before he was caught staring, and decided to clear his throat instead, “Thanks,” he said. 

Oikawa turned his head, obviously unsure of what Iwaizumi was so suddenly thanking him for, “hm?”

“For what you said to the paramedic. So I could do the pericardiocentesis,” Iwaizumi mumbled, averting his gaze to their patentin front of them. 

Oikawa huffed, quickly turning his head to the side. Iwaizumi couldn’t help but notice the way his ears flushed a gentle shade of crimson. 

“I only said it because by the time you switched with her, the patient would have been dead. You shouldn’t think anything of it,” Oikawa said in a flat tone. He didn’t even look over at Iwaizumi. 

Oikawa was arrogant, a surgery shark, and maybe a little anxious, judging by his twitchy hands and the bruise on his wrist. Iwaizumi didn’t take as many psychology classes as he did anatomy, but from his chaotic encounter with Oikawa Tōru, he could tell there was a lot more to Oikawa than was on the surface. Something about him made Iwaizumi curious to know more.

Their patient held on for the majority of the ride to the hospital, but as soon as the vehicle drifted to a halt in the ambulance bay, his pressure began to bottom out. The doors swung open, revealing the glass doors that led to the chaos of the emergency room. Oikawa and Iwaizumi jumped out of the rig, both on either side of the gurney, rushing it into the emergency room.

As soon as the doors opened, the atmosphere flipped on its back. Swarms of nurses crowded them as Iwaizumi’s ears filled with the sound of telephones ringing, nurses calling codes, the occasional screaming of a patient, and of course several attendings screaming at interns from across the room. Iwaizumi loved the ER. 

“43 year old male, MVC victim. His car flipped and he was trapped upside down,” Oikawa turned towards a nurse and gave her all of the details as they entered the ER. “Definite subdural hematoma and some internal abdominal bleeding as well. The brain bleed probably caused the seizure. We also had to perform a pericardiocentesis in the field.”

Their patient was a mess, but he had a fighting chance in surgery—a surgery Iwaizumi and Oikawa would get to scrub in on. 

As soon as they got into the trauma room, they began to hook the patient up to every monitor in the room. The cardiac monitor let out a horrible blaring sound as soon as his shirt was cut and the sensors were attached to his chest. 

“His pressure is bottoming out,” Iwaizumi breathed, letting the nurse tie the yellow, plastic trauma gown at the back of his neck as he slid his hands into skin-tight surgical gloves.

Their patient started to gain consciousness, opening his eyes and taking panicked breaths. With the brace clutched around his neck, he couldn’t turn his head, instead the man just moved his eyes frantically around the room. His words were slurred and low as he attempted to gain a sense of what was happening. Iwaizumi leaned over the gurney, making sure the man could see his face.

“Sir, you were in an accident, you’re at the hospital. You need to try to calm down so we can figure out what’s wrong and help you,” Iwaizumi said. The patient took slower breaths as he looked at Iwaizumi. “Is there anyone we can call for you?”

“M-my wife,” The man breathed, his brow was furrowed and his forehead was dripping in beads of sweat and blood. 

“Okay Mr. Takahashi. We will cal your wife and tell her what’s going on,” Oikawa said, joining in on the urgent conversation before a nurse left the room to go find his ID. 

Just then, the trauma room door swung open and doctors began filling in. One surgeon, dressed in the navy blue scrubs meant for attendings, took the lead at the head of the patient. He was a tall American man, around mid-forties, with dirty blonde hair streaked with silver. He used a light pen to check the patient’s pupils, tutting slightly to himself when he saw the same thing Oikawa had at the crash-site. 

“He needs surgery, book an OR and get him prepped for a craniotomy,” the attending, Dr. Williams, called, “page the head of cardio as well. She’ll have to do her work up in the OR.” 

They quickly pushed the rails of the gurney up and stepping back for the nurses to push it out into the hallway. Iwaizumi couldn’t help but grin slightly to himself and he and Oikawa eagerly followed the attending towards the elevator. 

The whole elevator ride up to the OR floor, Iwaizumi could not stop thinking about how great the surgery was going to be. It would be bloody, messy, and near impossible; and yet Iwaizumi was confident they could save the patient. He also knew that Oikawa was probably thinking the same thing. 

The elevator chimed just before the large shiny doors slid open to reveal a long hallway swarming with doctors and nurses. They quickly approached the door to an empty operating room, parting with the patient as he was prepped for simultaneous brain and heart surgeries. The surgeons pushed into the scrub-room, the dimmed lights emitting a subtle navy glow. Dr. Williams immediately began to scrub, aggressively running the sponge between his fingers and up his forearms. 

Just as the interns stepped to the sink to join him, the attending turned to a nurse and said, in a clear, confident voice, “Page Dr. Daichi please. I need a good intern to help me.”

Iwaizumi paused, barely having started to scrub he turned to his attending to inquire about his request for a  _ third  _ intern. 

Iwaizumi was just about to protest against Dr. William’s obvious intentions to not allow him to operate, but Oikawa best him to it.

“What do you mean?” Oikawa asked, “we were on the scene why do you need Daichi?” 

Exactly. Iwaizumi couldn’t help but notice how the excitement that had flooded his veins suddenly dropped, and his blood went cold. 

Why did he need another intern? 

Iwaizumi quickly got his answer when Dr. Williams released the water pedal and turned to Oikawa, who stood there like a disappointed child. His face was blank and defiant as he looked Oikawa condescendingly in the eyes. 

“Neither of you are operating.” 

The worlds stuck into Iwaizumi like a knife to the gut. His stomach dropped.

“What do you mean neither of us are operating?” Iwaizumi pried, “we found him at the scene—we...we pulled him out of his car. He’s  _our_ patient.”

“No ,” Dr. Williams deadpanned, “This is my patient, which means I get to chose who assists. And therefore neither of you are operating.”

Iwaizumi was pissed off now. He could see the way Oikawa’s shoulders fell, and could feel his own hands clenching. His blood was pulsing rapidly through his veins. 

That was their patient and there was absolutely no reason for two perfectly good interns to be kicked off a case like this. Especially if they were just going to be replaced by another intern.

“That makes no sense,” Iwaizumi argued, turning to fully face Dr. Williams. He couldn’t help but notice the way the older man kept his face completely blank—as if kicking Iwaizumi and Oikawa off of the case they literally found on the side of the road was the simplest decision in the world. Why wasn’t Oikawa saying anything?

Dr. Williams rolled his eyes, letting out a heavy sigh as he brushed past Oikawa. 

He looked at Iwaizumi with disdain, “you can’t operate with an open face laceration.” Iwaizumi opened his mouth to protest but Dr. Williams quickly cut him off. “I don’t care if it covered, you need stitches and I’m not going to have you near my patient Dr...”

“Iwaizumi,” he retaliated through mildly clenched teeth. 

It only got worse when Dr. Williams turned only slightly to address Oikawa. 

“And you,” he finally turned to face Oikawa, who still stared blankly at his attending, his eyes eager but his shoulders dropped and tense. The next words that came out of the man’s mouth confused Iwaizumi more than anything.

“I just don’t need you,” Dr. Williams dismissed.

Oikawa finally reacted. His nose scrunched and his brows furrowed. The corners of his mouth twitched slightly, and he took a deep breath. 

“You have no right to kick me off of this surgery,” Oikawa snapped. 

“Actually I do-“

“ _No._ You don’t. You  _ know _ I’m one of the best interns in the entire hospital. You know that. You have no right—no reason, to kick me off if this surgery,” Oikawa said, his voice breathless and short. The disappointment that had flooded into his eyes was now laced with anger from the injustice. 

“I already said that I don’t need you—I don’t  _ want _ you scrubbing in with me. And for the record, I’m the attending. You are nothing but an intern so if I say you aren’t scrubbing in then you aren’t scrubbing in.”

Iwaizumi couldn’t believe what he was hearing. The complete  _ bullshit _ that was spewing from this guys mouth was incomprehensible. Sure, attendings have a lot of power over the interns—they are the teachers. However what Dr. Williams was doing to Dr. Oikawa was an absolute abuse of his power. 

“That’s—“

“In the meantime you can do sutures, if you  must do  _ something _ ,” Dr. Williams said. “I happen to know of someone who could use a few stitches.” Dr. Williams looked away from Oikawa so he could roll his eyes at Iwaizumi. Oikawa did not look over towards Iwaizumi, instead he stared straight at the attending.

Before anyone else could retaliate, the wooden door swung open and the head of cardio entered, followed by her favorite lanky red-headed intern. The cardio surgeon gave an awkward side-eyed glance as she noticed the tension between a fellow attending and two interns. Dr Tendou, his intern, noticed as well. It wasn’t long before Daichi entered the room, and the four surgeons pushed into the operating room, leaving Oikawa and Iwaizumi standing alone in the scrub-room. 

The silence was brutal. Iwaizumi was so angry he wanted to storm into that OR and stab Dr. Williams with a 10-blade. His blood was boiling over to the point where he was ready to break something. Iwaizumi couldn’t even imagine how Oikawa, who blankly stared at the door which lead to the surgery that had been ruthlessly ripped away from him. 

_I don’t need you_.  What a stupid excuse.

Oikawa’s chocolate hair had settled in an unruly way as a result of the chaos the two of them had handled. It laid in thick strands over his forehead and stuck out at the back. His eyes were blank, but his mouth continued to twitch. The navy hue of the lights overhead glowed cleanly onto his olive skin, making it appear softer than it already had. Iwaizumi wanted to break the silence. Instead he just stared at him. 

“You need stitches,” was all Oikawa said before spinning in his heels and pushing back into the busy hallway.

Iwaizumi suddenly felt embarrassed, remembering the rather large laceration that was displayed on his cheek like a painting. He was also aware of the temporary bandage he had stuck on there in the ambulance. Face red and heated, Iwaizumi stuffed his hands into his pockets and followed Oikawa out. 

Why wasn’t Oikawa saying anything? Why was he acting like nothing had happened at all? 

Iwaizumi was so confused, sliding into the small procedure room to find Oikawa, his back turned towards the other, pulling open a suture kit. He didn’t know what to say or do, Iwaizumi wasn’t even sure if Oikawa needed reassurance. Everyone knew he was the best intern in the hospital, that he graduated top of his class at a medical school that wasn’t even in Japan. 

Iwaizumi had been utterly baffled by what had gone down in that scrub room. He knew first hand that Dr. Williams was a cold, ass of a man, but he had never seen him do anything like that. He had never seen any of the attendings refuse to teach an intern; and yet, Oikawa acted like it happened all of the time. Sure, Iwaizumi knew of the rumors that traveled the halls, and not just the ones of Oikawa’s surgical brilliance, but he did not even want to begin to  _ think  _ about what said rumors had to do with what he had just witnessed. 

Finally Oikawa turned back to face him, standing awkwardly in the doorway. 

“You know I can just put some surgical tape on it and it’ll be fine. You don’t have to do this-“

Oikawa scoffed, “if you think I’m going to let you ignore the stitches you need and ruin  _ that _ fac-“ Oikawa cut himself off. “Just sit down.”

The tall brunette held his gaze and nodded towards the examination seat in the center of the room. It was made of pale blue cushions, covered in that typical doctor’s office sheet, sitting right in the middle of the room under a large spotlight, which make Iwaizumi feel even more exposed when he reluctantly took a seat.

“Am I allowed to ask what just happened?” Iwaizumi asked, watching Oikawa snap the survival gloves onto his hands. 

“Am I allowed to say no?” Oikawa replies, his voice clear. He flicked his finger against a syringe, holding it close to his face so that he could avoid Iwaizumi’s interrogating gaze. He held the needle (not nearly as large as the one Iwaizumi had used earlier) right against his cheek, thumb positioned on the handle.

Iwaizumi could only shrug. He wasn’t exactly sure if he wanted to know the details. At the same time, Iwaizumi couldn’t help but ask. Whatever it was, it seemed to be rather personal.

“Hold still.” Oikawa’s voice suddenly grew soft and very suddenly Iwaizumi noticed all to well how smooth his skin was. 

He also noticed the way his long eyelashes fell over his dark eyes—eyes that glinted gold even in the artificial shine of the surgical lamp he adjusted above his head. He even noticed the dark, scattered freckles on the perfect curve of his neck. Little things came to his attention that made Iwaizumi struggle just a little to pull his gaze away. 

Soon enough Iwaizumi felt a pinch from the needle as Oikawa injected the lidocaine to numb the area.

As Oikawa went to clean the wound, he paused, sighing deeply and averting his gaze. 

“Dr. Williams,” Oikawa began, his voice still soft, “knows more about my personal life than I would usually tell my co-workers.”

Iwaizumi wish he didn’t know what Oikawa meant. Part of him wanted to tell Oikawa, to explain that he knew how he was feeling, but the words didn’t come out. He just sat there quietly as Oikawa turned back to the tool tray to set up for the stitches. 

His neck again—the way his olive skin contrasted with his navy blue top. And then it was his waist-

Iwaizumi was snapped back into reality when Oikawa turned, holding the suturing tools in his gloved hands. 

“Are you going to tell the chief?” Iwaizumi asked.

“Hm?” 

“About Williams. And how he’s neglecting to teach you,” Iwaizumi said, trying not to move his face as Oikawa leaned in and began to thread the 3-0 proline through his cheek. 

Oikawa laughed breathily, right against Iwaizumi’s cheek. He couldn’t help but notice the way his heart pounded in his chest. He hoped that Oikawa wouldn’t notice.

_ It’s just because he’s so close _ ... Iwaizumi told himself.

“What would the Chief even do?” Oikawa scoffed. “Fire his head of neurosurgery? Or fire me, the intern who hasn’t even taken the medical boards yet?”

He was right. Williams was both of their superior and had more power over interns than most normal jobs would.

There was a surgical hierarchy for a reason. Oikawa may be brilliant, but his surgical experience was nothing compared to an attending’s. Especially one who’s been a surgeon since both Oikawa and Iwaizumi were children. 

Williams definitelyenjoyed messing around with the younger, less experienced surgeons, but he takes it too far with Oikawa. 

Iwaizumi was suddenly thankful nobody knew anything about  his personal life. He wasn’t sure if he could be as calm and composed as the person sewing his face back together. 

Oikawa leaned in closer as he tied the end of the last stitch on Iwaizumi’s face. Iwaizumi fought himself trying to stop himself from locking eyes with the other, or from letting himself stare too long at the freckle on his neck. His eyes weren’t blue or green, but they were distinct—dark brown so that one could barely see the difference between his iris and pupil. His eyes were highlighted with streaks of gold. His eyes were bigger rounder than most of the people in Japan, though still held the same gentle curve as anyone else’s. 

Nobody should be allowed to be that hot. 

Iwaizumi had to hold his breath, with Oikawa’s face so close to his; it was almost as if he was going to whisper in Iwaizumi’s ear. 

The quiet was tranquil. The only sound in the room was their breathing and the persistent buzz of the artificial lights. The quiet was also painful, though. With no sound, the only thing Iwaizumi could focus on was the slight touch of Oikawa’s fingers on his cheek. 

He knew barely anything about this guy, only that he was arrogant and stubborn, but also incredibly brilliant. Iwaizumi was also aware of something else about Oikawa’s character, which may not be something he  _ should  _ know—but he did—and the fact did not make it easier to keep himself from staring at the smooth back of Oikawa’s neck.

“Almost done,” Oikawa murmured, turning back to the surgical tray and placing the suture materials down. 

The other intern pressed a piece of surgical tape over the sutured cut, smoothing it over with his finger. Finally, Oikawa sighed and took a step back. 

“Alright,” he said, his voice picking up its former tone. “Fifteen perfect sutures. There’s no way that’s going to leave a scar.”

Iwaizumi rolled his eyes, instinctively bringing his fingers up to feel the stitches. He was right, even without a mirror he could tell that the stitches were perfectly parallel, and impossibly aligned. It would have taken Iwaizumi about half an hour longer to get his sutures this perfect. 

“Thanks,” he said, sliding off of the procedure chair to stand next to the other doctor. Iwaizumi almost allowed himself to notice that Oikawa was slightly taller than him. 

“Yeah.”

Oikawa pulled off the surgical gloves and threw them into the medical-waste bin, sliding his hand onto the door handle. 

“So you aren’t going to do anything about Williams?” Iwaizumi asked, unable to just sit there and let him leave. He was still pissed about what Dr. Williams had said. 

Oikawa didn’t turn away from the door. He scoffed, almost laughing. 

“What can I do?” 

And then he left the procedure room. Iwaizumi wasn’t exactly sure what had just happened between them; Oikawa had sutured his face, obviously, but it felt like that wasn’t all that was going on. 

Or Iwaizumi was just overthinking. 


	2. No Right

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oikawa and Iwaizumi find themselves working together once again, this time fighting for the lives of more than one person.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again!! I’ve returned with more IwaOi content :) things are just starting to heat up, so I’m super excited about this fic!!  
> I hope you’re enjoying this so far, because I’ll probably have more time to write over the holidays, with school out. I also hope all of your are having lovely days!!  
> Also if any of you are artists, I’d be absolutely over the moon if you all could make some art for the fic! You can send me anything you come up with on my tumblr :)  
> tumblr username: swimminginnoodles
> 
> I love hearing from all of you, so if you enjoy this chapter leave a comment at the bottom.   
> Enjoy!

Oikawa quickly slammed the door of the on-call room behind him. He checked to make sure that the dark room was empty before he slid down with his back to the door and sat on the floor, his heart pounding in his chest. 

“Dammit,” he whispered to himself, sliding his palms across his face and hiding in his fingers.

Why did that just happen? 

He couldn’t believe how he had allowed his expectations crushed to pieces right in front of another intern. He couldn’t believe that he had just been kicked out of an OR by an attending for  _no reason_ and Iwaizumi Hajime of all people had been there to see it. 

Iwaizumi Hajime must pity him now.

The worst part was that he wasn’t actually kicked out of the OR for  no reason— infuriating as it is. Everyone knew, probably, even dedicated surgical interns like Iwaizumi. 

Despite his talent and work ethic, everyone saw Oikawa as the intern Dr. Williams liked to kick around. 

He took a shaky deep breath, running his fingers through his hair. 

He wanted at least  _one_ person to see his talent before his sexuality. 

Oikawa  hated Dr. Williams. For everything he says to him and for neglecting to teach him. Oikawa was just as good as any other intern, but Williams refused to see that and it made Oikawa so  _mad_. Even the way the attending  _ looked _ at him made Oikawa’s stomach churn. He hated Dr. Williams.

The worst part was, he felt like everyone knew. Interns are required to rotate onto every surgical service, spending a week working with different surgeons on different specialties; whether it was cardio, neuro, trauma, pediatrics, general, plastics, the list goes on and on. So as Oikawa rotated around with new interns and residents all working under the select group of attendings, rumors probably spread like a wildfire. 

His friends felt bad, Oikawa knew, and the majority of the doctors at the hospital would never treat him like Williams does, but people still stared and whispered sometimes. He couldn’t bear imagining any of them pitying him—Oikawa hated that idea more than anything.

Williams was the head of neurosurgery; which, much to Oikawa’s dismay, was his favorite specialty. The brain was just so vast with mysteries and unknown functions, Oikawa couldn’t help but be attracted to the crown jewel of human anatomy. He loved how the attention to detail was so refined in neurosurgery—one tiny mistake and a surgeon could alter someone’s entire life—there was no room for mistakes. Neuro surgery was delicate and focused, instead of being barbaric and chaotic like the other specialties. 

So when Oikawa suffered through Dr. Williams service, he fought tooth and nail for every opportunity to learn something. When there were other attendings in the room, Williams would let him hold a scope, maybe even the suction. He took in every movement the older man made, every decision was catalogued into Oikawa’s memory so he could become an even greater brain surgeon than the man next to him. 

Oikawa looked at his watch, the hands barely pointing towards 6:00. He was going to miss rounds if he sat against the on-call room door for any longer. So Oikawa took a deep breath, pulling his head out of his hands. 

At least he and Iwaizumi weren’t in the same intern class, which meant the other intern had probably already forgotten about him. Chances were, Oikawa wouldn’t even come in contact with him for a very long time...Oikawa shouldn’t even be thinking about what just happened—it won’t happen again. 

Then why couldn’t Oikawa stop thinking about dark hair that stuck out in messy spikes, and sharp green eyes with tints of hazel and charcoal grey. Why couldn’t he stop imagining what his smooth bronze skin would have felt like against his hands, had he not been wearing surgical gloves. 

Stupid. Stupid, stupid  stupid.  He shouldn’t be thinking about that. He should be studying, or practicing in the skills lab; he needed to drag his mind away from cute boys with big cuts on their face. 

So Oikawa pulled himself off the floor and headed down to the intern’s locker room.

“You’re late.” 

“I’m not,” Oikawa huffed, pulling his navy top over his head and shoving it into his locker.

“Yes you are, I got here and you weren’t already in scrubs with all the best cases in your hands. And you have about one minute to change into scrubs before Tanabe walks in and yells at you for being unprepared,” Kuroo said, the snark in his voice seeping even more so through the annoying expression on his face. 

But he was right, as if on a timer a third year resident, a tall woman with a blank expression framed by long dark hair walked into the locker room, just as Oikawa had pulled his scrub top out of his own locker. 

The room went silent, their resident in command spoke up. “Okay, you’re all here so listen up. It’s time for rounds. Daichi is in surgery with neuro, Kuroo you’re on plastics, Miya you’re with the general surgeon...and Oikawa...put a shirt on please you’re with Ohara on pediatrics.”

Oikawa quickly slipped into his scrub top and turning towards the door, where much to his dismay, Iwaizumi Hajime was standing behind his resident. Kuroo slipped a stethoscope around his neck and skipped out the door. 

And Oikawa, his face prickling with heat, followed his resident down the hall. 

“Dr. Ohara has an especially difficult case and has requested  two  interns to assist him,” Dr. Tanabe said, clutching a clipboard to her chest, as she walked quite quickly down the hallway, “two  good  interns. And since I don’t really like any of mine I had to borrow Dr. Iwaizumi from the other class. Dr. Ohara will meet you up in the OB-GYN wing because that is where you are needed.”

She stopped in front of the elevator dramatically turning around so that her long hair blew around her shoulders. Looking straight at Oikawa and Iwaizumi she lifted her chin and said, “don’t embarrass me or do anything stupid. Please.”

The elevator ride up to the OB floor was as awkward as it could get. It was empty and silent, neither of them said a word—both of them just stared blankly at the shiny metallic doors. Four floors. 

Oikawa glanced to the side, where Iwaizumi stood on his heels, staring at the floor. 

There was a patient who needed their help. The patient did  not need Oikawa distracted by the man standing next to him. And Oikawa, on the other hand, did  not need Iwaizumi pushing him against the elevator wall and kissing his stupid face, as much as he thought about it. 

The silence was painful. There was no subtle intimacy, like there had been in the procedure room, so they just stood there, stewing in the awkwardness. 

Oikawa couldn’t take it.

“It would probably be better if we both forgot about what happened this morning,” Oikawa said, his voice breathy but strong, as if he was forcing the words out of his gut. 

_This is ridiculous_ , Oikawa scolded himself. He didn’t even know if Iwaizumi even cared.

“Which part?” Iwaizumi asked, still not making eye contact. Two floors. 

_ The part where an attending neurosurgeon kicked me out of the OR because I’m gay. Please . _

“Let’s go with all of it,” Oikawa mumbled.

“Okay.”

The elevator dinged and the thick doors slid open, revealing halls bustling with pregnant women and doctors dressed in rose-pink scrubs. The OBGYN wing.

Dr. Ohara was waiting for them outside a patient room, brightening when he caught sight of the two interns approaching. He was a shorter man, with short black hair that was peppered with silver. His face was round and soft so that when he smiled the small gap between his front teeth showed more than ever. He was a kind man, but his expertise in surgery was second to no other pediatric surgeon in the area. 

“Ah, you must be the interns Dr. Tanabe has chosen for me,” he chirped. “I’m glad she gave me the good ones because what I’m about to show you will be one of the most difficult pediatrics cases you two will ever face. So, for the next week you’re going to be spending almost all of your time at this hospital.”

Oikawa and Iwaizumi modded eagerly. 

Pediatrics cases were difficult—it was always hard watching a child go through surgery amongst other painful procedures—but they were also incredibly rewarding. Not to mention, peds was one of the most competitive specialties there was, considering how difficult it was to operate on a premature baby. 

Oikawa needed something difficult.

“Alright,” Dr. Ohara sighed, turning to open the door behind him. He handed Oikawa the patient chart and revealed to them the surgical case that would change both of their lives. 

The room was crowded, filled with nurses and orderlies that scooted around each other as they went about their business. There was an Obstetrician, standing at the patients bedside with an OB resident beside him. Oikawa recognized her from somewhere—Kiyoko, was her name. 

The patient however, was a woman who lay uncomfortably in the hospital bed, her arms resting on her extremely pregnant stomach. 

She was covered in wires, attached to more monitors than Oikawa could count. 

The OB attending cleared his throat, and Dr. Kiyoko spoke up, “Mira Kazuko, 32 weeks pregnant with quadruplets.”

“Right and what’s the normal gestation time?” Asked the OB.

“Normally it would be 40 weeks, but with twins it’s 36, so with quadruplets it would be 34 weeks.”

Four babies. Four sick babies, of course, or Oikawa and Iwaizumi wouldn’t be there. Oikawa couldn’t imagine what it would be like taking care of one sick baby, much less four, all at the same time.

That’s a lot of kids. 

“And that,” Dr. Ohara said, “is where I come in. And don’t worry Mrs. Kazuko, I’ve got the best interns working on your case.”

He turned to Oikawa with the chart, “Dr. Oikawa is going to tell us a little about baby C.”

“Okay,” Oikawa breathed. “The baby has a condition called hydrocephalus, which is a buildup of cerebral spinal fluid in the brain. The excess fluid puts pressure on the brain, which could be damaging.” 

“Thank you,” Dr. Ohara said. “The good news is that we’ve caught it early enough. We will be able to take care of the problem very quickly.”

Mira’s panicked look faded slightly. She still looked uncomfortable, but considering the four babies she was carrying, discomfort was to be expected. 

“How will you fix it?” She asked.

Ohara turned his attention to Iwaizumi now, nodding slightly for him to proceed. 

Oikawa passed him the chart, unable to help the way his heart skipped a beat when his hand grazed over the other’s. 

_Damn_ ,  he really shouldn’t feel this way for people he just met.

That being said, Iwaizumi was smart, talented, and  _hot_ . 

Iwaizumi briefly looked over the chart, reading the procedure scheduled for Baby C after it’s birth. 

“Our head of neurosurgery is going to install a shunt to drain the fluid. If the procedure goes smoothly we’re looking at a complete recovery,” Iwaizumi said, giving the patient a mild curl of his lip to instill even a little comfort in her. 

After all, she had four children with medical problems before they’ve even been born. 

“And baby A? You said there was also something wrong with her too?”

“Yes. Your baby has a condition called hypoplastic left heart syndrome. As soon as she is born, we will have to operate. The odds for this surgery are not great, but we have a fantastic cardio thoracic surgeon, and without the surgery your daughter will not survive the night,” informed Dr. Ohara. “I’ll have our head of cardio thoracic surgery come speak to you and answer all of your questions. Once the babies are born you won’t have any time to answer questions.”

“Okay,” breathed the patient. 

“And the second baby? The boy?” Asked Mira’s husband, a quiet man who had been standing in the corner, a very horrified look on his face. Dr. Ohara looked to Oikawa.

“Right. He has an omphalocele, which basically means his organs are growing on the outside of his body.” Oikawa took a breath. This must be horrifying for an expecting mother to hear. “Dr. Ohara is going to make a small incision on his abdomen, and put them back inside.” 

“That’s the scariest idea yet,” signed Mira, reaching out so that her husband could take her hand. 

“It’s going to be alright,” mr. Kazuko mumbles. 

“Alright,” said the OB, “we will let you get some rest. I’ll be in to check on you later—Dr. Ohara and I will get some further scans for the surgeries.”

The surgeons regrouped outside the patient room, the interns eagerly waiting for their next instructions. 

“I have some kids I need you two to round on,” said Dr. Ohara, closing his clipboard. “Stay nearby and page me if anything goes wrong please.” 

Dr. Ohara shoved a large stack of patient charts into both Oikawa and Iwaizumi’s arms. He grinned at the two dumbfounded surgeons before spinning on his heels and leaving them standing in the hall. 

_We’re just rounding on sick kids_ , Oikawa told himself,  _it’s not like we’re on a date_. 

“Um, okay. The kid in room 223 is first, I think,” Oikawa said, flipping the patient chart open and scanning through it.

Their first patient was a fifteen year old boy who has been suffering from kidney failure his whole life. 

“He’s been on dialysis for almost his entire life,” Iwaizumi murmured, leaning slightly over Oikawa’s shoulder to read the chart. “It must suck to go through that as a high schooler.”

All Oikawa could do was nod, humming in agreement. 

It’s true. For most people high school was the best part of their childhood—Oikawa had enjoyed the high school part, not so much living with his family. 

“Did you go to high school around here?” Iwaizumi asked, his tone perfectly even, like he actually wanted to know.

“Nope,” Oikawa replied, lengthening his stride slightly as they approached the patient room. Iwaizumi only hummed in response.

“Good morning,” yawned a middle-aged woman, sitting in a chair at the edge of the patient room. The patient, a teenage boy—despite the fact that he was already fifteen, he looked more like he was twelve—was sitting awake in the hospital bed. 

The room was littered with games and wires, common for teenagers who are trapped in hospital rooms and have been sentenced to bed-rest for their whole life. The boy frowned, looking to the side, away from his exhausted mother. 

“How’d you sleep?” Oikawa asked as he approached the patient, sliding his stethoscope under the hospital gown and listening to his heart. 

“He slept,” the patient’s mother murmured, “I didn’t.”

Oikawa nodded, moving the stethoscope to the young boy’s back. His heart and lungs sounded okay, but after checking his current kidney function, Oikawa frowned. His kidneys were failing quickly, and if he doesn’t get a transplant soon, the rest of his organs will follow suit. Once the rest of his body starts to shut down, it would be like a boulder rolling down the hill—they wouldn’t be able to stop it. Oikawa turned to Iwaizumi, who seemed to have the exact same idea in his head. 

“We should page Ohara and tell him to call UNOS, right?” Iwaizumi murmured, taking a step closer to Oikawa. They were just interns—neither of them had the authority to try to move the boy up on the transplant list. 

“Right,” Oikawa said, scribbling his notesin the chart. 

The mother, on the other hand, seemed to sense the tension between her son’s doctors. She looked up at them with big eyes, overflowing with fear. 

“What?” She asked, standing up from the armchair in the corner of the room. “What is it?”

Oikawa swallowed. The worst part about working with kids was having to explain to a parent that their child is dying. 

“His kidney function is down,” Oikawa said, closing his chart and facing the mother. He took a deep breath. “We’re worried that the rest of his organs will start to fail as well.” 

“What-“ she stuttered, “what would happen then?”

“He’s saying I’ll die without a transplant, mom,” the boy deadpanned, clutching the edges of the blankets on his hospital bed. She walked towards her son and grasped his hand. 

“We’re going to page the head of pediatrics and try and get him bumped up a few spots on the transplant list. We won’t worry until we have to,” Iwaizumi cut in quickly, placing the patient chart back onto the edge of the bed and standing in front of the terrified parent. 

“Okay,” their patient’s mother sighed, still holding onto her son’s hand. 

So the two interns left the hospital room and turned to the nurses station. Iwaizumi leaned over the counter and asked a nurse to page Ohara and get his patient moved up the transplant list. 

Fifteen years old, and his life was full of doctors, monitors, medications, and surgeries. Oikawa hated feeling this way when he should be more focused on the medicine—he was a surgeon, the psychiatric wing was on the fifth floor. Oikawa shook his head, trying to clear it of the intrusive overwhelming empathy he felt for a child he had no relation to. Oikawa hated pediatrics. 

He hated being a kid, hated being a teenager even more, but he couldn’t imagine being sick at the same time. 

He almost laughed, still looking down at the counter of the nurses station. 

“What?” Iwaizumi asked, turning towards him, one eyebrow raised.

“Nothing,” Oikawa said, but couldn’t help thinking about how stupid it was for him to be jealous of the kid with a mother who cared so much about him. It actually made him laugh.

“Seriously. What?” Iwaizumi pressed, his face turning from weirded out by Oikawa’s sudden outburst of laughter, to just plain confused. 

“Seriously. It’s nothing,” Oikawa said, his smile fading from his face. He stared down at the counter and shook his head slightly. 

Ten years ago his parents didn’t give a shit about how Oikawa was  _feeling_ . His father only cared about his grades and ability to suck up to rich old men in suits. And Oikawa’s mother and sister were no help; their lives were entirely controlled by his father. Oikawa was good at both school and social situations, of course, but that didn’t mean there weren’t  other things  that pissed his family off. Neither his mother nor his sister spoke out against the ‘master’ of the household, but Oikawa did; and he had plenty of scars and anxiety to show for it. The screaming matches and threats didn’t stop until he moved out, and even then Oikawa got several angry phone calls. 

So yeah, the idea of parents like the one he just gave horrible news, was a little funny to him. 

But Iwaizumi didn’t need to know that. Oikawa didn’t need to seem even more useless in front of him. 

Sighing, Oikawa stopped pinching his wrist and turned back to Iwaizumi, looking straight into the other’s pretty green eyes.Then he pulled his face into that fake smile he’s used since he was ten. 

“Who’s next?”

***

Iwaizumi was not sure how to feel about his current situation. He spent the morning saving a life with Oikawa, only to have an incredible surgery pulled right out from underneath them. For what? Oikawa may act like it’s no big deal, but for some strange reason it made Iwaizumi’s stomach burn. It made things awkward, and Iwaizumi couldn’t tell if his uneasy feeling came from the impending threat of four extremely unhealthy babies on the way...or if it was from Oikawa’s obnoxiously pretty eyes. 

Anyways, Iwaizumi had been dragged from his own intern class into another one, and shoved directly back in Oikawa’s direction. He wasn’t sure how to feel about that. On one hand he was annoyed that he had to hang around an incredibly arrogant, stubborn surgeon; but on the other hand, a small part of him was desperate to know more about him. 

But Iwaizumi had no choice. And he sure as well wasn’t going to let Oikawa outshine him like every other intern in the hospital, as much as the other confused him. 

Oikawa and Iwaizumi spent hours worth of rounding on patients and performing procedures on children, and Iwaizumi barely said a word to him. He felt like he should start a conversation at least—they would be working together for the next week, maybe more. At the very least they should be friends, maybe. But everything Iwaizumi said to Oikawa put the other on edge. It was annoying, how smart he was. But what was more infuriating was how everyone could talk to him—everyone except for Iwaizumi. 

So they stitched up knees and made sure little kids took their meds until finally both of them felt the pang of hunger biting at their stomachs. So Iwaizumi suggested they’d break for lunch. 

“I’m...going down to the cafeteria. If you want to come,” Iwaizumi stumbled over his words, stupidly trying to sound less awkward than he was feeling. He wasn’t usually this bad at socializing. 

Oikawa actually looked at him in disbelief, surprised by his suddenly, half-invitation to lunch. He stared at Iwaizumi for a moment, his moth slightly agape before coming to his senses and replying. 

“I-uh-I told Kuroo I’d meet him in the skills lab. Sorry,” Oikawa said, his eyes lingering in Iwaizumi’s. 

“Right,” Iwaizumi said, stuffing his hands into his lab coat as he rocked back onto his heels. “Yeah.”

Oikawa nodded, turning around and waking down the hallway, leaving Iwaizumi staring at him from behind. 

“So why’d you get pulled into the other intern class this morning?” Hanamaki chided, shoving food into his mouth as he stared at Iwaizumi. 

“I wasn’t pulled into the other class. I was assigned to Dr. Ohara’s service and he wanted another intern from the other class. So we went over there,” Iwaizumi tried to avert the prying. He knew that as soon as he said something, anything, about Oikawa, the other two interns in front of him would not shut up. “It’s no big deal.”

“Oh yeah? And the huge gash on your face, that’s no big deal either then? Those sutures are perfect, so obviously you didn’t do them yourself,” Hanamaki teased, laughing when Iwaizumi kicked him under the table. 

“I bet Ohara heard that you came in with that huge MVC case this morning. Is it true that you did the pericardiocentesis on your own. In the field.” Matsukawa joined in. “You must be a big shot now, that surgery was probably insane.”

“Actually, I didn’t scrub in,” Iwaizumi murmured awkwardly. He really didn’t want to go into those details, so he changed the subject. “And the stitches are a long story. But Ohara has a patient that’s pregnant with quadruplets who all have crazy medical conditions, and all of them need surgery. So I get to scrub in on all of those.”

Then the question came and Iwaizumi couldn’t avoid it.

“Who else did he put on his service?” 

Iwaizumi took a bite of his sandwich, looking between Hanamaki and Matsukawa, trying to predict their reactions. Thankfully he was granted a slight distraction when another intern slid into the chair next to him. Daichi was also in their class, but less likely to interrogate him to the end of time. 

“What’s going on?” The shorter brunet intern asked, observing the intense looks of curiosity broadcasted on Matsukawa and Hanamaki’s faces. 

“Iwaizumi got in on the quadruplets case, along with the four crazy surgeries that go with it,” Matsukawa said, side eyeing Iwaizumi with his dark, heavily-lidded eyes. 

“Damn, I wanted in on that,” Daichi said, “who else is on Ohara’s service?” 

There it was again. No point in avoiding it now. 

“Oikawa Toru,” Iwaizumi tried to say as confidently as he could. He really had no reason to feel so awkward just saying his name. 

“Dammmmnmmnnnn.” Hanamaki whistled. “Iwaizumi’s working with the big-shots now.”

“What are you talking about? He’s an intern like we are,” Iwaizumi scoffed, turning his attention back to his food. 

“Yeah but he might as well be a third-year resident,” Matsukawa murmured. 

“Not to mention he’s hot,” Daichi said, shrugging. “And not just regular hot he’s like really fucking pretty, to the point where it shouldn’t even be allowed.”

Everyone turned to stare at Daichi, Hanamaki even snorted at Daichi’ out-of-character comment. It was true, of course. Oikawa was quite distracting.

“What? Its true. You should definitely hit that, Iwaizumi,” Daichi said as his pager went off. He got up quickly, turning back to the two of them before leaving the cafeteria. “Now I’m jealous of you. Cool surgeries and you get to work with Oikawa; I’m stuck working with Williams.”

After watching Daichi disappear behind the cafeteria door, Iwaizumi turned back to the other interns in front of him. Despite being his best friends, Iwaizumi didn’t like telling people things, not even Makki and Mattsun. Not that there was anything to tell; but if he were anyone else he’d probably be going on about the car crash this morning, and maybe even the guy he saved a life with. But Iwaizumi wasn’t that guy—he doesn’t talk about feelings nor does he know how to express emotions the way everyone else does. 

“So,” Makki said, his face still mildly stuffed with food, “what’s he like?”

“Who?” Iwaizumi decided to play dumb.

“Oikawa Toru, of course. I mean, some people lucked out and got out in the same intern class, but we didn’t. I’ve never talked to him, and I don’t think Mattsun has, but half of the hospital is obsessed with him. So tell us what he’s like,” Makki sat up straight in his chair, his light eyes eagerly staring at Iwaizumi from his pale, freckled face. Even Mattsun looked up from practicing sutures on cafeteria fruit.

He was right, half of the intern class practically worshipped Oikawa. Sure, he was brilliant, a social limelight, and well, stupid hot; but the way people spoke about Oikawa made him out to be some sort of doll, or something. They made him sound unreal. 

Maybe Iwaizumi was overthinking it. People loved drama, so they made Oikawa out to be some sort of celebrity—it gave them something to gossip about. The idea actually might have made Iwaizumi twitch a little thinking about it. The gossip was nothing like the real situation at all. It was all whispers from nurses, claiming the cute, talented intern had flirted with one of them at the coffee cart. They talked about seeing him in the skills lab, the research lab, even the on-call rooms. Honestly, Iwaizumi felt bad about the spotlight they had put an intern under. 

“He’s okay I guess,” Iwaizumi said, shrugging. Mattsun looked up at Iwaizumi through his heavy eyelids and thick lashed, raising a dark, bushy eyebrow in response to Iwaizumi’s pathetic response. 

He didn’t really know Oikawa at all anyways. Maybe he was wrong, and Oikawa was actually some hospital superstar, but Iwaizumi just couldn’t see it. 

“Oh come on,” Hanamaki whined. “You have to give me at least a little more.”

“Fine. Fine,” Iwaizumi waved away Makki’s stupid pleading face. “He’s probably as smart as everyone makes him out to be, and yeah, his sutures are unreal, but other than that I don’t really know. For someone who talks a whole lot, he definitely doesn’t give much up about himself.” 

“You’re forgetting something,” Mattsun murmured, turning his attention back to the banana he was stitching together. They knew Iwaizumi better than he would like to admit.

“Fine.” Iwaizumi groaned, running his hand through his unruly black hair. “He’s attractive too.” 

“I’m not even into guys and I think he’s hot, Iwaizumi,” Makki teased. He leaned over the table and rested his chin in his hand, his cheeks squishing against his palm and making him look even stupider than he sounded. “Just admit it, you think he’s God’s greatest creation.”

Iwaizumi rolled his eyes. 

“Yeah well you’re definitely not the only one,” Mattsun snickered, “Oikawa probably has people lining up the street just to sleep with him. Guys and chicks, most likely. Interns and nurses, I bet there are even a few residents and attendings who would be willing to abuse their authority to get with Oikawa.”

Makki nodded in agreement, but the comment must have caught Iwaizumi off guard. Matsukawa was right—Oikawa would be the one-night-stand of a lifetime, and there were plenty of people who would want to take advantage of the fact that Oikawa was still, twenty-five and only an intern. 

Iwaizumi didn’t like the uncomfortable feeling in his stomach. Thinking about other people lusting after Oikawa made his shoulders tense and his insides turn over. He knew what it was—it was jealousy—but he didn’t like it being there. Iwaizumi had no right to feel that way. 

“I wonder if he’s ever slept with anyone in the hospital,” Makki pondered, sitting back into his chair. “With his reputation, he could probably have any chick in the building.”

The guy really couldn’t sit still. 

Eventually Iwaizumi was fed up with everyone talking about Oikawa. Maybe he was annoyed with the fake confidence Oikawa seemed to project onto the entire hospital, or maybe he hated the way people acted like Oikawa was some sort of otherworldly being. 

There was a digging feeling in his gut. He wanted to know more about him; and maybe that wasn’t fair. Maybe Iwaizumi didn’t get to know. But there was definitely more to him than a pretty face, a brilliant mind, and a whole lot of arrogance. And the fact that people couldn’t see that made Iwaizumi just a little pissed off—even if he shouldn’t be. He had no right to feel like this.

Iwaizumi pushed his chair out from the table and stood up. Makki and Mattsun stared at him suspiciously as Iwaizumi left the cafeteria, his face prickling with heat. He needed to check on patients; he didn’t have time to think about Oikawa.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Thanks for reading :)  
> I hope you enjoyed the second chapter, it’s really starting to get good.   
> If you liked it please let me know and leave a comment and a kudos, I love to know what you all think. You can also ask questions about the AU and how all of the characters fit into it. I love sharing my headcannons for this AU.  
> If you like this AU, you can check out my other work that focuses on SemiShira some years later.


	3. Pieces of You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Iwaizumi and Oikawa’s patients are both in need of surgeons. Meanwhile, they both struggle to understand one another.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!!!  
> I hope everyone had a lovely holiday!! This chapter is actually pretty long so I hope it’s worth it. I’ve got a ways to go with this fic but don’t worry it’ll get interesting real soon:)
> 
> I love this AU so much and I really Hope that all of you do as well. If you have any questions about the AU, or if you’d like to hear any headcannons I have for it just let me know in the comments.  
> I love hearing what everyone thinks of my work, so please, if you enjoy it leave a comment or a kudos. It makes me so happy to find that someone enjoyed the chapter.   
> Also, if any of you happen to be artists, I would LOVE to see artwork for this AU! It would be so cool! If you ever happen to do that share it with me on Tumblr!  
> My tumblr username is Swimminginnoodles  
> I hope you’re all having a great day, enjoy the newest chapter!

“You’re doing it wrong,” Oikawa murmured, leaning back in the rolling chair and crossing his arms. The skills lab was dim, the gray sky outside the windows contributed little to the single fluorescent light above them. It had been raining quite a lot recently, making the air around them stale and dry. Oikawa didn’t know how to feel about the rainy season, even after living in Japan for nearly six years—he liked the rain but hated the gloomy atmosphere that came with it. 

“I’m doing it fine,” Kuroo murmured, not taking his face away from the microscope that sat on the table in front of him. Under said microscope was a small styrofoam cup, and beneath that was a Japanese 1,000 Yen. Gripping a red pen’s tip tightly between his fingers, Kuroo slowly maneuvered his hand towards a narrow hole in the overturned cup, attempting to make a dot on the nose of the scientist pictured on the 1,000 yen. Instead, Kuroo stuck the bright red pen right into the styrofoam, missing the hole by at least three centimeters.

“Yeah sure,” Oikawa chided. “You do it just fine. Although, the whole point is to mark Noguchi’s nose...isn’t it?”

The tall, dark haired resident pulled his narrow face from the microscope just so he could glare at Oikawa. He twisted his mouth slightly to the side, the way he always did when someone teased him; and, after being roommates for close to a year, Oikawa knew exactly what would push the other’s buttons. 

“It’s not as easy as it looks,” Kuroo whined, rolling his eyes. Oikawa shot him a look,  _ duh _ . It’s not like he hasn’t spent hours trying to perfect his own hand-eye coordination with the microscope. Kuroo knew that far too well. Sure, Oikawa was smart; but he happened to be in a building full to the brim with some of the smartest people one could possibly find. Even the residents and interns he competed with were just as brilliant as Oikawa was—Iwaizumi Hajime, for instance. 

He remembered their brief conversation at the most awkward party Oikawa had ever been to (honestly, who thought it would be a good idea to force some of the most socially inept people to  _meet-and-greet?_ ). Oikawa didn’t really remember anything specific about that night; he’d been flirted with by several female interns which was, frankly, exhausting. But by the time the intern mixer was over, Oikawa had easily identified what his competition would be like. 

Kuroo Tetsuro, his dark hair slicked back and his incredibly tall stature towering over the young lady he was attempting to flirt with. He stood out to Oikawa as someone who would probably be a pain in the ass. He’s actually was pretty surprised when Kuroo became his closest friend in the building, eventually convincing Oikawa to let him stay in his apartment.

Another was Tendou Satori—someone who caught Oikawa’s eye almost immediately with his messy, fiery red hair. He seemed to be the most uncomfortable person in the entire building. After attempting to approach the (other) incredibly lanky man, Oikawa decided the only thing he would get out of him was his department: surgery. 

Then there was Iwaizumi. Something about him immediately broadcasted that he was to be a surgical intern, though Oikawa couldn’t place his finger on it. Sure, he noticed Iwaizumi for other reasons, but the crowd of people Oikawa had found himself surrounded by was occupying most of his attention—even though he was pretty sure  _nothing_ was more distracting than Iwaizumi Hajime in a suit. 

But Oikawa and Iwaizumi were placed into separate intern classes, and they barely came in contact for months. The attendings spoke highly of Iwaizumi, he had quick wits and was a solid surgeon, from what Oikawa picked up; but he never really knew much until earlier that day. 

But now they were stuck together on the pediatrics floor, and Oikawa wasn’t even sure how he was supposed to feel about that. 

“Dammit!” Kuroo hissed again, once more slamming the pen into the styrofoam cup with the grace of a cow. The sudden clash of Kuroo dropping the writing utensil onto the table snapped Oikawa away from his thoughts. He turned his head to where his friend and colleague stood angrily at a neurosurgical microscope. 

Oikawa sighed and pushed himself out of his chair, joining Kuroo at the table. 

“Move over,” Oikawa said, picking the pen up for himself. Kuroo slid over, grumbling to himself as the other positioned himself at the microscope. “You stand too close.” 

“I do no-“

But then Oikawa slowly let his hand down, gripping the tip of the pen as he gently poked the man on the yen in the nose. Kuroo stopped talking as he gracefully lifted the pen back up, stepping back from the scope and pulling the yen out from under the cup. Oikawa held up the thin piece of paper and shrugged smugly as Kuroo crossed his arms and huffed. 

“Too bad the head of neurosurgery kicked you out of the OR this morning,” Kuroo said sarcastically, dramatically falling backwards into a desk chair behind him. 

“You heard about that?” Oikawa almost winced at the comment. If Kuroo knew, then it wouldn’t be long before the whole hospital heard about it.

“You  _and_ Iwaizumi! Didn’t even let you scrub.” Kuroo was almost laughing now—Dr. Willaim’s abuse of power had practically become a joke between the two of them. “You know, now that I think of it, he probably thought you guys came into work together!” 

Oikawa froze, his face suddenly prickling with heat. If that’s what Williams had assumed, then Oikawa was in a bigger predicament than he had originally thought. The older surgeon was constantly hazing him for being a guy who liked other guys, but if he thought that he and Iwaizumi were  _together_ , more problems were definitely going to arise. Not to mention the shit Iwaizumi would probably get from it as well. 

“Iwaizumi isn’t like that,” Oikawa mumbled, turning back to the microscope in embarrassment. 

“Really?” Kuroo pried, “you’re  sure he isn’t into guys?  _Positive_ ?”

“Pretty sure,” Oikawa said. He really wanted this conversation to end. All talking about Iwaizumi did was make him  _think_ about Iwaizumi; and that didn’t help the fact that Iwaizumi was, most likely, straight. It didn’t help with the nagging feeling of disappointment creeping up Oikawa’s spine either. 

“Whatever you say,” Kuroo shrugged, his usual sly tone sinking back into his voice. Oikawa rolled his eyes, taking a step towards the door. His face, ears, and the back of his neck seemed to turn rose-red at incredibly inconvenient times. Kuroo was about to read him like a book.

“I guess you would know best. At least I’m not the guy getting kicked out of very cool surgeries for no good reason; because if that happened to me... I’d for sure do something about it. Or I’d just get with the very hot guy who’s been sent to me by fate—I bet a night with him would be better than one surgery anyways.” 

Oikawa’s face was burning now. He turned to Kuroo, his expression stupidly smug from his success in pushing Oikawa’s buttons. He half pouted-half glared at Kuroo, before turning towards the door. 

“At least I’m not the one who’s screwed a quarter of the nurses in the entire hospital,” Oikawa retorted as he pushed the big swinging doors open and edged out of the skills lab. 

Oikawa walked briskly down the hallway, his brain swarming with the normal sounds and atmosphere of the hospital. Everything around him could move to slow-motion; the bustling nurses, ringing telephones, the steady rhythm of the cardiac-monitors. The same sounds Oikawa had become so accustomed to over the past year. The only thing that could snap him to attention would be his pager, the blaring alarm of a code-blue, or a screaming attending. 

Most people hated hospitals. They saw them as somewhere infested with death, sickness, misfortune. But interns loved it—especially Oikawa. He loved the sterilized smell, the rush of surgery, and even the shitty mattresses in the on-call room. The hospital had become his home, and would be his home for the rest of his life. Oikawa was okay with that. 

So yeah, maybe it was possible that he’d fall in love at the hospital as well.

When he got back up to the pediatrics floor, Oikawa noticed Iwaizumi at the nurses station. He looked awkward, standing there, uncomfortable maybe. He faced the counter, leaning over it and tapping his foot on the ground as he stared at a patient chart. Oikawa didn’t know what his break was like but if he knew Iwaizumi better...maybe he’d even say that Iwaizumi was embarrassed. 

Whatever had gone on it certainly put Iwaizumi on edge. 

Oikawa offered a greeting, which only startled the other, almost making the short, dark hairs at the base of his head stand straight up. Flint green eyes turned to Oikawa as Iwaizumi stood up, pulling a patient chart towards him from across the counter. 

“I, uh, ran some labs on our kidney transplant kid,” Iwaizumi said, pulling his gaze away from Oikawa and grimly looking into the patient room. “The results haven’t come back yet but I don’t think they’re going to be good.”

“Okay,” Oikawa said, racking his brain for some sort of temporary fix. The kid was running out of time, and won’t even be considered for the transplant list until he’s too far gone to save. If they’re lucky they’ll be able to slide in right before all hope is lost, but the chances of getting a matching donor in time were low. The boy’s mom wasn’t a complete match either. Even then, if they got lucky, they could be so late getting the organs in they’d have to face the threat of rejection. The look on Iwaizumi’s face told Oikawa that he was worried about the same exact thing. 

Oikawa asked, “did Ohara say anything about UNOS and the donor list?” 

“He said the best we can do is hope for a directed donation,” Iwaizumi said, his mouth pulling into a grim frown. 

“So we just have to wait for someone to die in our ER to save a teenage boy,” Oikawa scoffed. So much for the healthcare system these days. 

“Looks like it,” Iwaizumi said, shaking his head. “There’s got to be some other way. By the time he’s high enough on the list to actually receive an organ donor he’s going to be so far down the drain we probably won’t be able to save him.” 

“The rules suck,” Oikawa sighed, leaning back on the nurses’ station. 

“Yeah.”

They were still yet to have a normal, non-medical conversation, but at the same time Oikawa felt a little more hopeful that he’d, at least, eventually be able to talk to him. It was hard, trying not to put up borders and get so defensive after Iwaizumi had been there for the embarrassing situation with Dr. Williams. He hated being vulnerable. He hated people like Dr. Williams who made him feel vulnerable. 

* **

Their kidney-failure patient only got worse as the days went by, still with no sign of a donor. His vitals slowly deteriorated by the hour. His kidney function was going down the drain.

Iwaizumi and Oikawa could only watch; there was nothing they could do for the young boy until a donor kidney became available. 

Unless that happened, their patient wasn’t going to get better. It was painful to watch. Every time they caught word of an accident in the ER—any kind of head trauma, really—the two of them would find themselves hovering outside the trauma room. This usually resulted in Dr. Williams or the neuro fellow scolding them for stalking. But their patient would die without a transplant, and neither of them wanted to watch a fifteen year old waste away like a sickly bird. 

Iwaizumi could feel it too, the weight of working in pediatrics, watching sick kids get sicker. They said that children were more resilient to disease, but Iwaizumi felt like they were too small to be able to survive harsh surgeries. 

He and Oikawa would take turns watching the patient, insisting that they’d stay so the mother could go and get some actual sleep for once. The nights were hard, staying awake and pushing medication to keep the patient from slipping away. They’d futility attempt to reassure a mother on the verge of breaking—trying to tell her that her child would be okay...that he stood a chance. 

Iwaizumi had just finished checking on the mother of the quadruplets when he came back to the pediatrics wing. It was late in the morning on their third day on their pediatrics rotation. The expecting mom was stable, along with four decent fetal heartbeats. She seemed to be on the right track; too early of a delivery could cut the babies’ survival rate in half. But everything seemed fine in that wing of the hospital—not so much in the other. 

He walked down the tranquil hospital hallway, eyes trailing down the shiny white tiles, hands stuffed into his lab coat pockets. He had stayed in an on-call room that night, while Oikawa had spent the night keeping watch over their dying patient. Iwaizumi rounded the corner when he approached the nurses station. 

Oikawa was asleep in an office chair, his long legs pulled up into his chest and his head lolled to the side onto his shoulder. Despite his uncomfortable position, he actually looked peaceful. Iwaizumi paused for a moment, leaning onto the nurses’ station, his attention caught by the sight of Oikawa curled up and passed out in the chair. He was way too pretty for his own good. 

“He fell asleep an hour or two ago,” the nurse who appeared at the counter said. “I figured I wouldn’t wake him unless the patient was coding or something.”

Iwaizumi turned to the patient room, looking through the glass window to see a unusually stable patient sleep rather normally. Looking back to the pretty intern in the chair, Iwaizumi couldn’t help but smile, just a bit, at the sight. Messy, chocolate brown hair strung about the olive skin on his forehead, long eyelashes resting on his cheeks, and his mouth slightly agape, he slept curled up in a stupid chair. 

“So, uh, are you going to wake him or am I?” The nurse murmured, gently elbowing Iwaizumi in the ribs. “If you go in there without him, we both know he’ll be pissed.”

Iwaizumi felt his face go red, steaming from his cheeks and ears. Oikawa actually looked peaceful for once, the intense look of focus that was constantly chiseled into his face had melted into something tranquil. With his brilliant eyes closed, Iwaizumi could see the softness in the curve of Oikawa’s cheek—he didn’t look so arrogantly intelligent when he was sleeping. Still mind numbingly gorgeous, though. 

Iwaizumi swallowed, “you wake him up,” he told the nurse.

The nurse shrugged, walking over and kicking the chair from behind, obviously not concerned with a rude awakening for Oikawa himself. He woke with a jolt, dark eyes shooting wide open when he quickly sat up and grasped the arms of the chair for balance. It wasn’t long before he registered what happened and made a face at the nurse before he noticed Iwaizumi standing on the other side of the counter. 

“Hey there Sleeping Beauty,” Iwaizumi teased, sending the other a grin. “Have a nice nap?” 

Oikawa glared right into Iwaizumi’s grin, reaching out and grabbing his lab coat and yanking it from where it had fallen onto the floor. He ran long fingers through his fluffy chocolate hair, the stands falling back into place like ruffled feathers to a bird. His dark eyes were brimming with exhaustion; honestly, Iwaizumi felt exactly the same as Oikawa looked. 

Neither of them had left the hospital for days, sleeping whenever they could in on-call rooms and empty gurneys in the hallways. It was the life of an intern, endless nights of watching over patients while the attendings and senior residents got the sleep. After all, interns weren’t the ones actually performing the surgeries, they only watched attendings do it. That being said, sleep-deprived interns can still make life-threatening mistakes.

“His temp is up,” Iwaizumi murmured, as he watched the monitor next to the bed. The kid was barely hanging on. Oikawa turned to the nurse.

“Alright push some antibiotics, make sure his temp doesn’t get any higher. Page us if anything changes,” Oikawa said, walking to the door, and standing back at the nurses’ station. 

Iwaizumi groaned, leaning on the counter and dropping his forehead onto the cold tile. He felt as if every part of him was made of lead, dragging behind him with every move he made. He just wanted to close his eyes and sleep for the next week.

“It’s only going to get worse once the quadruplets arrive,” Iwaizumi complained, his voice muffled from his face squished into the counter. 

“There’s a piggyback transplant happening in OR three right now,” Oikawa chirped, sliding the chart back into its place in the filing cabinet. “We can go watch, if that would make you feel any better.”

Iwaizumi was actually caught off guard, when Oikawa offered to go watch a (very cool) surgery together. It wasn’t a big deal really—surgeons watched other surgeries  _all the time_ — especially interns. It just...it was different coming from the lanky brunette standing beside him subtly pinching his bony wrist—again...Iwaizumi wasn’t sure what was up with Oikawa’s strange habit. But the offer had been made, as casual as it was. And yeah, watching an incredible surgery like that would definitely put him in a better mood.

“Yeah,” Iwaizumi said. 

When they got to the OR gallery, the surgeons operating below had just began to make an incision down the patient’s entire chest; they dragged the scalpel down the sternum and only stopped once they got to the diaphragm. Oikawa walked in and took a seat towards the front of the small crowd. Iwaizumi took the chair beside him. 

_This is stupid_.  Iwaizumi thought as he tried to slow his rapid heart rate. It wasn’t a date. Inviting Iwaizumi to an OR gallery (filled with many other surgeons) was not a romantic gesture. 

But it felt like it. 

Spending a lifetime in school, college, med-school, and now internship left next to no time for Iwaizumi to actually have a life. He spent next to no time worrying about relationships, so the fact that now he actually had the opportunity to even think about being interested in someone was a little overwhelming. And as arrogant as Oikawa was, Iwaizumi’s unusually rapid heart rate definitely made him think about it. 

** *

_Not okay_ , Oikawa told himself. Definitely not okay. There was an incredible thing happening right in front of them, and all Oikawa could focus on was Iwaizumi. A heterotopic transplant was a once in a lifetime surgery. It was one of the most incredible heart surgeries in the whole world. Oikawa wasn’t thinking about the surgery though, he wasn’t even feeling jealous of Tendou Satori who stood down in the OR, assisting the head of cardio in performing an  _act of god_ . 

Okay he was a little jealous. He loved neuro but that didn’t mean open heart surgery wasn’t badass. 

A heterotopic transplant, right in front of him. 

Oikawa could use a bit more hetero at that moment. 

Iwaizumi was totally taken by the operation; his sharp, slate-green eyes fixed on the two surgeons and their unconscious patient. His dark chestnut skin contrasted with his fresh white lab coat and powder blue scrubs; the back of his neck exposed when he leaned forward in the chair. Oikawa glanced to the side, his gaze trailing over Iwaizumi’s dark mess of hair. He couldn’t help but bring his fingers back to his wrist, ignoring the urge to reach out and attempt to smooth the messy tufts of hair on the other’s head.

Iwaizumi looked tired too. Obviously, neither of them had slept in their own beds since their first day on the pediatrics rotation; the on-call room mattresses were not nice either. Oikawa had spent many nights and days sleeping in the cramped rooms filled with tiny beds and exhausted doctors. Sometimes he’d even pass out on a gurney in the hallways, occasionally an empty patient room, or in some cases an office chair at the nurses’ station. Interns could be found dozing off anywhere in the hospital. 

And yet, neither Iwaizumi nor Oikawa fell asleep, sitting there in the quiet gallery. The only sounds were the soothing commentary of the operating surgeons, as well as a few hushed whispers from other observers. Normally someone as sleep deprived as they were would doze off, sitting in a dimly lit room for so long. Their focus was sharp, never pulled away from each other and the open chest cavity below them. As much as they might have wanted to fall asleep, they couldn’t. 

He wanted to say something. Even though there was a whole room full of other people, he wanted to say  _something_.  Oikawa could talk to anyone, literally. His whole life he’d been forced to converse with some of the most disgusting, annoying, disrespectful people in the entire world. His father was more worried about wealth and power than personality when choosing the people he worked with. That much was blatantly obvious. And for years, Oikawa would be shoved into a tuxedo and forced to participate in his father’s work parties. His job was to ‘entertain the guests and make his father look good’. 

It wasn’t easy at first, the rich old men were intimidating for him to be around. Eventually, though, he got the hang of pretending to be his father’s perfect heterosexual son. 

He hated it—having people obsess over him like an object. He had to just sit there and smile, looking pretty and listening to the derogatory comments thrown carelessly around him. 

But his father wasn’t someone he could easily disobey. Even if he did try to avoid it, he’d be punished in ways he would remember for a while after. And eventually his father decided he’d look better with a girl hanging off of his arm. His relationship with his parents only got worse after Oikawa couldn’t pull that off. 

As bad as it was, Oikawa picked up incredible social skills over the years. He could perfectly entertain anyone, no matter who they were or what they were like. 

Though, he also developed more anxiety triggers than he could count—some of witch included expensive dress shoes and the smell of cigars. The result was his bad habit that gave him ugly bruises on his wrists. 

So Oikawa had gone to med-school, working his ass off to get into a surgical residency program as far away from his family as possible. He needed to be away from that—he needed to be independent. Oikawa felt like saving lives would make up for the ones his father and the man’s stupid business ruined. 

And yet, with all the social skills he had, Oikawa couldn’t bring himself to start a simple conversation with the guy sitting next to him. Iwaizumi wasn’t that different from a normal person, even. He was probably even a better person than most. But when Oikawa tried to say something, all he could force out of his mouth was something medical, or something stupid.

Maybe it was the strangeness he felt when he was around Iwaizumi. Awkward,erroneous...strangely  _real_ . Oikawa felt so oddly comfortable around him that it felt uncomfortable. Maybe after being so fake for so long, he forgot how to do the opposite. 

* **

An incredible freaking surgery, right in front of them. Iwaizumi couldn’t get the idea out of his head that someday he’d be the lead surgeon on a badass operation like the heterotopic heart transplant, often referred to as the piggyback transplant. The old and new hearts worked together to pump blood through the body. It was so cool, Iwaizumi couldn’t stop himself from geeking out over it. 

But his pager could. 

It started blaring about an hour into the surgery, it’s loud noise startling him and every other person in the room. Just as Iwaizumi looked down onto the tiny display of ‘911’ broadcasted on his pager, Oikawa’s joined in with the same message. 

It was the quadruplets. 

“Shit,” Iwaizumi hissed, as the two of them scrambled out of their chairs and away from the gallery. 911 was bad—it meant something  _really_ bad was happening. And it was way too early for the expecting mother of four to go into labor. 

“She can’t deliver yet, it’s way too early!” Oikawa said, his breath short as the two of them ran through the hallways. They dodged everyone and everything that got in the way of the two surgeons getting to their patient as soon as possible. 

When they got to the patient’s room it was quite clear there was something wrong. The room was already swarming with doctors, each nurse and volunteer directed by the attending OB and attending Pediatrics surgeon, Dr. Ohara. When the two interns arrived at the scene they instantly reported to Dr. Ohara.

Their patient was in a massive amount of pain; the cardiac monitor slowly increasing as she cried out. Ohara held an ultrasound wand to her stomach, his usually cheery face turned darkly serious. He passed the wand to Oikawa once they arrived, turning to the monitor. 

“There’s fetal distress,” Ohara said, his voice calm and even. After noticing the blood-stained blankets around their patient, he frowned. 

“The placenta is tearing we have no choice but to take the babies out now. Call the OR and tell them we need five of them cleared and ready,” the OB attending said in a stern, booming voice. 

“Right away doctor.”

They brought the railings of the hospital bed up, all of them futility trying to calm the patient herself. She took sharp, heavy breaths, clutching the edges of the mattress so hard her knuckles began to flush white. 

“Someone page neuro and cardio!” Ohara ordered. 

The babies were going to be delivered, which meant it was time to take action with their own individual medical conditions. The OB would take care of the mother, it was up to everyone else to save her newborns. 

“Head of cardio is still in surgery,” Iwaizumi told his attending, hoping that the information wouldn’t be costing the newborn with a heart condition it’s life. Ohara cursed under his breath. 

“Okay page him and ask for his resident. I could at least use Dr. Tendou. You stay with me on the heart patient,” Ohara turned to Oikawa. “You go with Williams and put in the shunt for the baby with hydrocephalus.” 

The two of them nodded, rushing into the scrub room to prepare. They pulled their hair into the scrub caps, tying them off at the back of their head. Then it was four and a half minutes to scrub; running the sponge aggressively up their arms, soaking themselves with antibacterial soap. The nurses draped the operating gowns on them, slipped their hands into gloves, and pulled up their masks as they entered the operating room. By then, the patient was draped, numbed and ready to be cut into. 

“Alright, as soon as the babies are out we will have to take them away to be operated on. There won’t be any time in between, I’m sorry,” the OB said. 

“Okay,” the patient sobbed, her eyes red and watery, brimming with fear as well as tears. 

Oikawa and Iwaizumi stood by their attending, awaiting instructions like a couple of soldiers. 

It was time for them to save some lives. It was too early, the babies were too medically compromised. But they had no choice. 

The OB made the cut, doing his part in bringing four new lives into the world. Soon enough the newborns were extracted, and each one was taken to their own tables. The room filled with the sound of weak crying, instilling at least a little hope into the doctors and patient as the babies were transported out of the OR.

Iwaizumi followed his attending out of the room, the nurses pushing his very small patient into the OR next door. He and Ohara rescrubbed, meeting Tendou at the table, ready to assist. The other intern’s fiery red hair stuck out from under his standard scrub cap, but his sharp eyes always told Iwaizumi he meant business. 

When it came to natural surgical skill, along with hard work and dedication, Iwaizumi was good; but, Tendou had qualities that could definitely rival his and Oikawa’s. 

He was different, of course, more awkward than most. His focus was almost entirely on his work; though he was known to actually be a funny guy from time to time. But his natural instincts and intuition when it came to surgery were promising. He fought anyone who dare try and take the head of cardio’s attention. Tendou was a mystery to a lot of people, but he was a good doctor and that was what counted right then. 

Though Iwaizumi wouldn’t admit it, he was a little disappointed Oikawa got dragged onto another surgery. He may have let himself get caught up on the idea of operating together. 

The baby had hypoplastic left heart syndrome, meaning the left side of her heart was way underdeveloped. The congenital defect made it difficult for the baby to properly circulate blood through her body. They’d perform one of the many procedures the child would need throughout her life, which would hopefully result in a healthy heart later on. 

“Ten blade, please,” Ohara said. 

When the lead surgeon made the incision, Iwaizumi couldn’t help but let his jaw drop behind his surgical mask. He noticed Tendou probably doing the same beside him. The baby was already underdeveloped, but his organs were so tiny it seemed impossible they’d be able to operate on them.

“Bet neither of you have ever seen a heart this tiny,” murmured Ohara, beginning to operate on the patient. It was barely the size of a walnut. Gently beating inside the baby’s heart. 

“How are we even supposed to get the sutures to hold?” Tendou asked, holding the retractor as he stared into the tiny cavity. 

“With very great care,” Ohara murmured.

The surgery was over in a few hours. There wasn’t much they could do so soon after the baby’s birth, so they worked to fix whatever they could at the moment. After scrubbing out, Iwaizumi followed the nurse who pushed the baby into the Nicu, where they kept the newborns post-op. It was dark outside the windows, but Iwaizumi still couldn’t tell what time it was. The hospital felt surreal whenever he tried to keep track of the time of day—he’d go into an OR in the evening and come out of it the next day. It was no use trying to keep his head on straight while he focused on the medicine. 

Eventually though, he checked, and it definitely was late. 

When Iwaizumi and his newborn patient got to the Nicu room reserved for the family, Oikawa was already there. He sat in a rolling chair beside what looked like an incubator. Inside was the baby he had operated on, a tiny shunt protruding from it’s skull. Behind him were two more infants in their own incubators. The nurse rolled Iwaizumi’s heart patient into the spot beside Oikawa, and he took a seat in the chair opposite. 

Then Ohara came in, leaning onto the doorframe as he ran his gaze through the now complete set of newly born quadruplets. 

“The two of you are going to stay here tonight. I can trust that you can monitor all four of them on your own?” He said, signing off on a chart he picked up from the table beside the first baby. 

Oikawa and Iwaizumi nodded. 

Ohara gave them instructions, then left the two of them without a word. 

Sure, having another intern or resident help monitor the fragile newborns might have been easier, maybe even let them take turns getting some actual, much needed, sleep. But for some reason spending an entire night practically alone with Oikawa felt oddly...intimate. And he wasn’t keen on sharing that with someone else. It was a weird way to think of the assignment. Maybe Oikawa was thinking the same thing, maybe he wasn’t. 

So yeah, Iwaizumi was willing to sacrifice some more of his sleep if it meant he might be able to actually interact with this guy. The guy who leaned his elbow on the baby’s warming box, and rested his head on his hand. All four of the infants were hooked up so many to wires and monitors, they looked more like aliens than human beings. It was their job to make sure they made it through the night. 

The room was tranquil, actually. The door was closed and so were the blinds on the one window between them and the main Nicu. The lights were dimmed, barely enough for Iwaizumi to notice Oikawa’s small facial features, like the two freckles on his neck that looked like a snake bite.

The only glow came from the baby warmers and the monitors. The neon shine of the heart monitors made the lighting change color just slightly, as if the room was colored to match Iwaizumi’s strange emotions. Maybe it was the late hour, but it all felt surreal.

They should settle in—it was going to be a long night. 

“They’re barely even alive and already they’ve been shoved into the hard part,” Oikawa murmured. He sat back into his chair, not looking up at Iwaizumi and keeping his gaze fixed on the baby.

“Yeah well, hopefully they’ll have a long life ahead of them,” Iwaizumi said, looking down at the newborn in front of him. 

“They’ll make it through somehow.”

Iwaizumi was tired of talking medicine to Oikawa. He wanted to actually talk to him, like a normal person who hasn’t spent their whole life behind books. And if he was going to get anything real out of this arrogant guy, now was the time. He needed to know more than the fake coverup Oikawa put on for his patients and colleagues. He had to at least try.

“You know you’re kind of a hospital spectacle, around here,” Iwaizumi said, looking up at the other and smirking. “Everyone seems to blindly worship you like some sort of god. I guess they haven’t seen the Oikawa who gets all soft around preemie babies.”

Oikawa raised his head, his mouth twitching into a smile at Iwaizumi’s snarky comment. 

“Oh please, the nurses love me for good reason. I’m always on-call and I’m more of a surgeon than half of the residents in the program.” 

Iwaizumi laughed, rolling his chair to the other side of his preemie. Now they were only two warmers apart, both relaxed into their chairs. Oikawa looked good in almost any lighting, but maybe the soft neon glow of the monitors atop his olive skin looked batter than it should have. 

“Yeah well your spectacle sure has created some impressive rumors,” he said, “you’re like the rare bird at the zoo that everyone stares at.”

Iwaizumi knew that feeling he had described for Oikawa. It brought him back to his days in high school, along with some unwelcome memories of his head being slammed into locker doors and bathroom stalls. The school did nothing, of course—even when he came home with a black eye and bloody nose, and his mother stormed into the principals office to throw a fit. Not that his stupid classmates got away unscathed.Iwaizumi wasn’t the type to get into fights, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t throw a punch.

“How do you know they were all rumors?” Oikawa asked, his tone lowering and gaining more tease with every syllable that slipped from his mouth. Iwaizumi wanted something out of him, he knew that, but the weird part was that Oikawa looked strangely compelled to tell him.

“Oh?” Iwaizumi said, raising an eyebrow. Oikawa crossed his arms. The glow from the baby warmer in front of him gently outlining the thin slope of his shoulders. “So I should believe it when I hear the stories? Maybe I should even start calling you ‘Our Holy Know-All Surgeon Oikawa’.”

“Depends.” Oikawa shrugged. “Maybe I should call you something cuter, after all I’m sure you’re just a big softie on the pediatrics floor.”

“Then, I should just assume that every nurse I work with has slept with you?” Iwaizumi teased. It was probably a personal question, but some part of Iwaizumi convinced him that particular rumor was complete bullshit. 

Oikawa’s face flushed immediately, in splotchy patches of pink. He nervously rolled his eyes. “Well, no,” he choked. “I haven’t slept with anyone in the hospital, if you really must know. That was quite the personal question, Iwa-Chan.”

Then he added, “do people really think I sleep around?” 

Wow, Oikawa was actually embarrassed. Iwaizumi wanted to pretend that the stupid nickname he was just addressed by didn’t embarrass him; as much as it did.

This time Iwaizumi shrugged. 

Oikawa scoffed, “well they do end up in my apartment, but that’s only because of my slutty roommate who brings a new one home every week. It’s actually pretty awkward when I see them at work less than twenty-four hours after finding them half naked in my kitchen. Why do you think I sleep here so much?” 

Both of them were laughing now, Iwaizumi felt completely relaxed around him. Nobody was dying. Oikawa was just a normal person—he thinks. 

“Oh and what about all the drama coming from your med-school? They say you went out of the country. Makes it sound like you came from another planet,” Iwaizumi laughed, leaning towards him from over the case. He had finally managed to pull out Oikawa’s natural smile; it felt as if the brief flash of perfect teeth was gravitational. His real smile was softer, less vapid than the fake one he used so often for whatever reason. It drew Iwaizumi in and pulled his eyes onto Oikawa’s soft lips. 

“I went to med-school here, in Japan. Although, technically that was out of country for  _me_.  I moved here in my first year as a med-student, so maybe you’d consider me foreign,” Oikawa said, glancing over at the monitor next to him, as well as the one behind him before he continued talking. “I grew up outside of Tuscany, Italy.” 

Iwaizumi almost sputtered, “you’re  _Italian_ ?”

Oikawa frowned. “Half.”

That... Iwaizumi couldn’t even describe how that made him feel. It made sense, obviously. Oikawa had creamy olive skin and big, round eyes the color of burnt chestnut. He was gorgeous, honestly—it kind of made sense to picture him on an Italian white sand beach, drinking fancy Italian wine. It was actually pretty hot. 

And yet, Oikawa frowned at that. He didn’t seem to like Italy as much as Iwaizumi liked the idea of it. He’s never even left Japan. 

“Well Iwa-Chan, you seem to enjoy interrogating me about personal stuff, maybe you should have joined the police instead of going into medicine.” Oikawa huffed, maybe even pouting a little. “It’s only fair that I get to know something about you.”

Iwaizumi sighed at the stupid nickname. Oikawa was right. “Fine,” he said. 

Oikawa smiled again, catching Iwaizumi off guard for the millionth time that day. 

“What about your family? Parents? Siblings?”

“Only child. My mom lives alone in Miyagi since my dad died when I was six. Car accident.”

Oikawa’s smile faded, his eyes softened. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Iwaizumi said. He hadn’t known his dad as well as most kids his age might have. Not that it didn’t suck, watching his mom go through it. “What about you?” 

Oikawa hesitated. “It’s complicated.”

And just like that Iwaizumi was finally able to get more out of him. Despite being so suave, Oikawa was actually on edge a lot. But he seemed to relax at least a little bit around Iwaizumi. And he liked that—the idea of Oikawa being comfortable around him—whatever it was that made him so hyper aware. Iwaizumi learned the little things about him, things that made Oikawa seem less like a celebrity character and more like an actual person. And then told his own to the other—things like how his mother loved to obsess over the tiniest things, and how that drove him insane. And despite the fatigue that dragged on their eyelids, the two of them sat there and laughed, joking and bitching about obnoxious superiors.

Though, there were times the other would sit back and pinch his wrist, even when he was laughing. The collage of dark bruises peppered his thin wrists; the tiny wrists went along with Oikawa’s waist, which really was the size of a fifteen year old’s. He didn’t understand the habit, but he knew it was probably fueled by anxiety. Which sent a wave of realism crashing over him, for even someone as confident as Oikawa could be anxious. 

He shouldn’t point it out, it wasn’t his place. So he avoided the topic.

“And what about the tattoo?” Iwaizumi asked, now almost completely teasing him. 

“The tattoo?”

“I heard nurses talking about a mystery tattoo. They acted like it was some big secret, so I assumed it must be pretty scandalous.”

Oikawa scoffed, “where?”

Iwaizumi laughed and tapped his index finger over the left side of his chest, below his arm and right on the edge of his ribs. Oikawa bit his lip, his focus seemed to wander back into his own mind. It almost looked as if he was reliving an unpleasant memory. 

“No tattoo there,” Oikawa said, breaking his gaze away from Iwaizumi and resting his head sideways on the baby warmer. “Just a scar.”

Every tiny piece of Oikawa felt like a part of the puzzle. Like a whole damn mystery. A scar.

Plenty of people had scars—they told stories about someone’s past. Iwaizumi had a few scars, though none of them told any interesting stories behind them. So he really shouldn’t be intrigued by Oikawa’s. It was probably none of his business anyways. 

“I had a splenectomy when I was thirteen. That’s all.” Oikawa said, his tone cutting off at the end. He obviously didn’t want to talk about it. 

So he left Iwaizumi to think about it. And with just the word splenectomy, Iwaizumi could tell a lot.

So as a thirteen year old kid, Oikawa had surgery to remove his spleen. It was a strange idea but as a surgeon, Iwaizumi couldn’t help but wonder  _why_ . Blunt force usually was the cause of a splenic bleed, but lots of things could cause that. A car accident?

He also knew that without a spleen, Oikawa had a compromised immune system. Which was strange, considering he worked in a hospital full of sick people. Removing the spleen was only done when absolutely necessary—so Oikawa’s was so damaged it needed to be taken out. 

He had no right to ask. So he didn’t. 

He looked over at Oikawa, who had gone back to resting his face in his palm. He was too pretty. But now his face was soft; gentle, even. He stared downwards, his mouth twisted slightly to the side in a small pout. Iwaizumi couldn’t help but imagine kissing that mouth. Maybe it tasted as brilliant as the words that came out it. 

And his hair, soft chocolate brown tufts gently falling over his forehead and into his eyes. It was neatly trimmed at the base off his head, the rest of it perfectly out of place everywhere else. Iwaizumi couldn’t help but wonder if it would still look perfect if he ran his hand through it. 

The more Iwaizumi knew about Oikawa Toru, the more he wanted to know. It was unfair, he knew that, even though they could probably call themselves friends now. 

But a big part of Iwaizumi didn’t want to settle with being just friends. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Welcome back from Iwaoi hell.   
> I hope you’ve enjoyed this abnormally long chapter!  
> If you did, please leave a kudos and a comment, I LOVE hearing from you all! Ask questions about the AU if you’d like!   
> I hope the rest of your day is great :)

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!!!!  
> I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of “Crash Into Me”!! I’m going to try my best to keep up with this fic but I have very little time when it comes to my sports and school.  
> I would absolutely LOVE it if you would leave a comment at the bottom, it makes me so happy to read what everyone thinks.  
> Have a lovely day.


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